


Power through Opportunity

by orphan_account



Category: Magic: The Gathering
Genre: Gen, collection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-24
Updated: 2016-02-28
Packaged: 2018-05-23 01:33:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6100474
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A single tragic event spurs one young man to seek power from what he believes is the greatest mage on Theros - Ashiok, nightmare weaver.</p><p>Collection of short fics exploring a fanmade backstory for the card Ashiok's Adept.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

It was hard to gauge who was the most powerful being in one place, let alone the entirety of Theros, but that didn’t stop Evaristus. As far as he was concerned, nothing in or out of the world, even the gods themselves, could stop him finding that fact out and using it to his own, full advantage.

He had been walking for almost half a day now, going from one little village to another, listening. Other people talked when they were having fun, he knew that well. If they weren’t talking enough for his liking, Evaristus always slipped a few coins to the bartender and jerked his head at whomever he deemed to be able to spin an interesting tale.

Evaristus took to sitting in public houses, hood down over his face. There were few things of interest he learned since he had started out. Still, he listened as closely as he could, hoping to pick up some information of note. Listening this way had earned him the knowledge of many strange, wonderful people. Powerful people. A tall tale of a man in Meletis with thunder in his eyes and a clock able to twist time turned out to to be quite true, but one look at the renowned Sage of Hours and Evaristus knew that this man, even if he were willing to share his power and abilities, would never let him achieve what he desired. He was far too full of himself for that.

A half-whispered rumour about a mysterious mage by the name of something like Achiok, who lived in the old temples scattered around Akros’ walls, had led Evaristus to pack up and set off again. He had a nice lunch of goat cheese and hard tack, his stick, and his cloak - that, plus the clothes on his back, was all that he had left.

He leaned heavily on the walking stick, knees weak. Walking had made his legs like jelly; despite his mother’s encouragement, he was just not cut out to for the line of work she followed. He didn’t have the body to be a traveling philosopher like she was… had been.

Evaristus, unable to ignore the soreness in his joints, quietly lay the stick down and sank into the cool grass, bent on his knees. It rustled around him, wind blowing through the tattered cloak. The information about the dream mage Achiok had been gleaned from the drunkard three days ago, pointing him to the crumbling temples around Akros. 

Three days was a long time to travel on foot, but he had made it.

Using the stick to haul himself to his feet, Evaristus raised his head. The countryside of green rolling hills swept across the land and gave way to the towering walls of Akros, far in the distance, with little gray dots between here and there. Those were temples, mostly to Iroas and Mogis, though some smaller, neater ones were devoted to Ephara. It was there, in a little Ephara-devoted temple, that Achiok was said to reside in. 

Evaristus thought he could see one of them about a kilometer away, its angular roof bearing the signature style of that temple. In Meletis, there were many temples such as this one, glowing with pure white paint, blessed by Ephara, god of the cities. Each was kept in pristine condition, good as the day it was built, by both the devoted Meletians and the presence of Ephara themself. This one was in no such shape, as Evaristus could clearly see as he neared it.

The white paint, one bright and pure, looked dim and ingy in the light of the dying sun. The tall pillars supporting the front of the building had cracks like spiderwebs all up and down, caused by the weight of years of neglect. Huge chunks of stone that once formed part of the roof laid near the entrance, partially blocking it. A rope of ivy thick as his arm twined around a fallen pillar, cracking it further. But it was not any less intact than that, and could still be lived in. It still had all its walls, at least, if not the roof. 

“Hello?” Evaristus’ voice cracked a bit. “A… Achiok? Dream mage?” 

He hoped, if Achiok was there, that that mage wouldn’t turn him down, or worse, laugh at him. He’d been laughed at too much, as of late. He stepped between the boulders and through the temple’s archway, struck by how good the inside was compared to the outside. Inside, Evaristus expected to see a disaster of cracked stone, crumbled altars, and creeping vines, but it was… surprisingly nice.

“Anyone there?” he mumbled. His confidence was rapidly being lost and replaced with frustration. Please, please let someone be there - 

The floor, through crisscrossed with cracks, was mostly smooth, as were the walls of the main chamber; in a better time, this area was used to pay tribute to Ephara. The altar in the center was left to its own devices to crumble away, but there was other furniture there - low tables and chairs, a reclining couch - to make up for it. Little else was in the main chamber, save for an odd lack of dust. 

Evaristus called again, half-heartedly. The temple looked lived-in sure, but that wasn’t a guarantee that Achiok would be here anyways. He took a seat in one of the chairs and put his stick across his knees. He knew what it meant if Achiok was another dead lead: more traveling, likely back to the tiny Akroan village where he had practically poured ale down other patron’s throats until they gave him some lead, wandering like a lost goat… 

What a life his mother had led! She had done this for most of her adult life, only settling with her husband long enough for her family’s sake. A philosopher in occupation, she had traveled the countrysides of Theros, spreading her own knowledge and finding knowledge in others. He stared at his hands, becoming lost deep in thoughts of the past, and a bitter smile found its way to his face.

Although her letters didn’t say much, they always promised the swift and sure visit once every season. Once, he heard a distant report of a traveling philosopher falling in with The Champion of Theros herself, but never knew whether it was his mother or some unrelated person, but he would not be surprised in the least if it was her. Evaristus wondered what she’d thought of this near-eternal travel. 

His sisters hadn’t been very influenced by their mother’s teaching, and neither had their father. A simple potter, Evaristus’ father didn’t aspire to much at all, staying at home and making pots in the garden. Vala loved getting her hands wet with the clay on the wheel, but Rakleia preferred to practice magic alone. How wonderful had that time in his life been, relatively peaceful and full of sunshine compared to now.

Evaristus suddenly felt wetness dripping on his hands. What a sap he was, crying over his family, but he couldn’t stop it - the one thought of her had unleashed a torrent of emotions that made him lace his hand over the back of his head and hunch over, sobbing into his lap. He was a little grateful no one seemed to be around to see him, crying his heart out like this. 

It seemed like ages when he finally finished crying.

The sun was long absent, sunk far below the horizon. Evaristus raised his head, eyes red from crying, and blinked a few times, surprised at how dark it was in the temple. There were no torches in the wall, and all the braziers lay still and cold. No light, not even star- or moonlight was present.

Evaristus stood, stick in hand, and wiped his eyes on his sleeve. He remembered the door being somewhere to the left of where he had been sitting, but it was instead on the other side. The furniture in the room had seemed to have moved around as well as Evaristus fumbled in the darkness, knocking over an urn that sat near the door. Strangely, he seemed to be able to see that well enough. He stood and stared at it for a few seconds, struck by something familiar. Although shattered, it looked just like one of the ones his father had made… specifically for… his room… was he home?

The chamber was suddenly illuminated with some odd ambient light, and a stroke of adrenaline went through Evaristus’ chest. Yes, he was home. This was his room, with the same trim and desk that had been there when he was seventeen. He remembered it quite clearly. Right before he had left for that trip to Meletis, he remembered seeing the same sight. 

He found himself racing down the hall in a blind panic. The day after he had left for Meletis in an excursion to find a living there had the been the day that… 

Evaristus’ little sisters, Vala and Rakleia, stood crying in the main hall, clutching their father’s nightrobes. He tried to shout at them to leave, but no sound left his throat. They were all staring at the door. Indescribable noises came from behind it, something like roaring and shouting from a hundred soldiers and lions all together. The clanking of armour, metal clang of swords - it sounded like a whole army.

Evaristus wanted to scream.  
Cold fear made his hairs stand on end, and he knew the others must be feeling the same.

“Be quiet, Vala. Everything will be alright.” Evaristus’ father had one hand around the handle of a heavy jug, his hand dark with something. “They can’t get in here.” His voice and hand both shook.

Evaristus himself was unable to move, forced to stand in one spot as the barred door burst in a shower of splinters and a tall beast, a man with a lion’s head and fur stepped through. Two others followed him, falling with a roar upon the three people in the hall, seemingly oblivious to the screams of Evaristus’ sisters. 

It all happened in vivid detail, a single cruel stroke of a sword, a hideous snarl, the  
of terror -

Evaristus woke screaming, curled in a ball on the floor of the old temple, his throat mimicking the last sounds of his family. 

Suddenly realizing what had happened, he forced himself to stop and suck in a breath. Nothing could have prevented it, nothing but Evaristus being there and having the  
and  
to protect them. He groaned, hurt by the memories. If he he had just  
then of course they would still be alive. He would’ve fought tooth and nail against those leonin. 

If he had just been there for his family and been  
“Then they would have still died, and you would have died with them there. The past remains the past.”

Evaristus nearly jumped out of skin at the voice that came from behind him, turning around with a strangled cry of “  
He fell onto his back, reaching for his walking stick.

What was there was a person - for lack of a better word - seated in the chair he himself had been in before apparently falling asleep and onto the floor. 

The other person was dressed in gaudy robes, heavy golden jewelry and an ornamented gorget that gleamed in the moonlight that streamed through a hole in the temple’s roof. Achiok - or at least Evaristus guessed it was Achiok - was grinning at him, showing an impressive set of pearly teeth set in a head that ended above the upper lip. A pair of angular horns shaped vaguely like a lyre rose from above their ears, a great quantity of black smoke pouring from between them. 

“How did you know that?” Evaristus breathed, clutching his stick to his chest, the words barely out of his mouth before he felt like smacking his forehead. Of course. As the rumour had went, Achiok could read dreams. Reading minds was not too far out of the question. 

“Are you Achiok, the dream mage?”

“Yes, my dear, though my name is  
iok.” Ashiok took to studying the long, claw-like nails that grew from their hands. “I’ve found you Therans can’t pronounce it for some reason.”

“Oh.” Evaristus settled on his knees, staring up at Ashiok. He felt like a fool; hopefully his mistaken pronunciation wouldn’t come off as a bad first impression. The ‘sh’ sounds was completely foreign to him. “Ah… I’ve come to ask you a favour.” 

He paused there, wondering if he should continue. Based upon the mage’s first words, Ashiok likely knew, or at least guessed, why he was here. “You saw my dream?”

Ashiok nodded. “Was it too rude of me to pry into it?” 

Evaristus thought bitterly. “No. But… ‘the past remains the past’... perhaps it does, but I can still prevent the same thing from happening in the future.” These words energized Evaristus. “If I can gain power through you - I mean, studying under you - then I can perhaps avenge Iretis, and then… I mean, if you would have have me as your apprentice…”

Speaking suddenly felt too awkward for him, and his words were sticking in his throat. Evaristus was making a massive fool out of himself.

“Is that what you wish?” Ashiok rose from the chair, floating barefooted above the floor. “For such a noble cause as the prevention of another disaster as had befallen Iretis… very well.” 

Evaristus’ eyes shone, his mouth open in a grin. “Really?” The doubt that had been present before seemed to lift off his shoulders.

“If you wish to achieve that through the art of nightmares, fear, and the manipulation of emotion and the minds of others… I suppose I could spare a little knowledge.” 

That marked the beginning of the first of many encounters Evaristus was to have with Ashiok, and that of his road to self-empowerment.


	2. Chapter 2

Evaristus was talented enough in dream magic to separate dreams from reality, but what he was experiencing now caused his perception to waver.

In this dream - he was sure it was one - he was calm. At peace. In the place he loved so much, doing the things he desired more than anything else. This was a happy dream, solely because he was home. 

Or rather, at a pretend version of it.

Dreams told you things, not verbally, nor through images, but in a sort of just knowing. Or making him know. Evaristus once had a dream in which he was venturing through caverns by the beach, and the dream made him know they had once housed an ancient civilization of lobster people. Just a feeling, an automatic infer of what the dream somehow knew. 

Right now, the dream was making him know he was in a sham.

The trees in the garden were wooden figures, the ground wood planks. There was Vala, and Rakleia, and Aeschylus, his family… Evaristus couldn’t tell whether they were real, or just actors. but either way, it still gave him a comforting sense of home. How his life used to be.

There was an audience out somewhere in front of him, but Evaristus didn’t pay them any attention, losing himself in the dream. Perhaps he could just play along, and pretend to act. It felt convincing enough for some small comfort.

The letter in Ev’s fingers made a lovely soft sound as he read it. It didn’t seem like a prop, given its crisp handwriting and classic touch of his mother’s words. He sat against the base of his favourite tree, knees pulled up to his chest. 

Dear Evaristus, Rakleia, Vala, the note went, my travels are far from over, but I have reached Setessa. I am currently lodged in the temple of Nylea there, and have a lovely view of the warrior’s training grounds. I cannot write much more, as I am quite busy with sharing my writings with the disciples here, but will send a longer note later.

Tell your father to write me a letter too, sometime.

Best regards, your mother,

Olexa 

Evaristus loved her handwriting - nice and sharp, right to the point, and a constant reminder that she was still out there, thinking of her family during her travels. According to the dream, he hadn’t shown the letter to his sisters and father yet; the warm, soft, happy feeling that came from reading them was too wonderful to share. He had to drink as much of it in as possible. 

And anyways, Vala and Rakleia were too busy playing in the garden to look at letters they couldn’t even read yet.

They liked to do that, race around among the leaves and dirt. Vala with her wooden sword, pretending to be a Setessan warrior, Rakleia with a stick spear, playing the part of a leonin raider. 

Aeschylus, their father, watched the pair run by while he finished painting a clay vase. There was little that could make that man stop his art, rambunctious children included. He used one foot to gently nudge a completed vase out of Vala’s way as she streaked by, and resumed his work.

“Quick! To the towers!” Vala tossed aside her sword and replaced it with an imaginary bow. She made whooshing noises while running backwards, pretending to battle while retreating. “I’m raining arrows on you now, Rakleia.”

“You can’t rain arrows from a single bow!”

Vala scoffed. “Yes, you can! Mom told me all about archers and stuff.”

Their lines were natural, following a conversation they had had in real life many years ago to the word, as Evaristus remembered it. He only knew it so well because it had happened just before he had left for Meletis, and as such, were among the last words he had ever heard.

“Raining arrows from one bow is like a thunderstorm from one cloud,” Rakleia said, remembering an analogy her mother had once told her. 

“Aww… see, this is why I like to be the raider; you overthink things too much!” She stopped her retreat and stood by the tree in the middle of the garden, pouting.

“Raiders don’t have to think, especially minotaurs,” Ev said from his spot at the foot of the tree. 

“Exactly! Hey Ev, whatcha got there?” Vala leaned on his shoulder, breathing heavily. She felt real, to be sure, but Evaristus couldn’t render her face well enough to see if it was her, or just another actor. Another odd thing in dreams: objects and images not being visible, but only suggested, not fully there or fully detailed, but just enough to know.

Evaristus turned his head, a sly look on his face. “Oh, just a letter from mom.” 

His sisters both screamed in that excited, happy little kid way that hurt Evaristus’ ears. Joy shone in their dark eyes, making happiness well inside Evaristus. Ah, how good it was to see his sisters so excited. Even Aeschylus looked up from his art for a brief moment

“Read it! C’mon!” Vala leaned over Evaristus’ shoulder and reached eagerly for the letter. Her fingers brushed his cheek in the process.

“Lemme see! Hey, you think we can get dad to read it for us?” 

A sudden bolt of adrenaline shot through Evaristus’ chest. It almost felt like he was in a falling dream, with his gut going into his chest, and his higher organs crawling up his throat.

He looked up, startled, staring into the somber faces of an assortment of people seated in the auditorium. 

“This part of the play is so sad,” someone in the front row said. “He’s so happy, and he has to see his family die…” 

Evaristus looked back to see a man wearing a fake lion’s head enter the scene, acting as a leonin, and his heart froze.

Vala screamed in terror as the other actor gently rested his wooden sword against her neck, and she crumpled to the ground. More faux leonin raiders entered, pretending to slay Aeschylus, before setting fire to the boards supposed to represent Evaristus’ house. Everything they did would have sent Evaristus screaming in reality, but it didn’t affect him here. 

Rakleia valiantly tried to battle the warriors herself, but was struck down despite the measures. She lay quietly as possible, though one eye still remained open.

And then all of a sudden, lightning flashed, and the fantasy of the dream dissolved like paper in the rain, and turned into an ugly lump of a nightmare.

It was all so real - the trees were trees, the leonin an actual being instead of an actor in costume. The audience was no longer there. Real rain pattered softly onto the very real corpses, and their horrifically real blood soaked into the ground.

One warrior turned to Evaristus, still frozen with shock, and raised his sword. The metal glinted in the rain, and then ran red with his blood.

\---

“Have you slept well?” Ashiok said. They sat on the stone chair in the old temple, holding a half-eaten wrap of honey and goat cheese. “You seem shaken.”

Evaristus blearily stared at their mentor’s pleasant smile. “No. I haven’t. Not really.” His own breakfast lay neglected on the stone table next to him. Of course, he only called it breakfast because it was the first thing he would have eaten since waking up. Right now, the sun was setting.

“A nightmare, I suppose.” Ashiok paused to lick honey off their claws. “Was it inspiring?”

“Not really.” Evaristus rubbed his eyes. 

“Come now. Every nightmare is inspiring, every one evokes emotion and fear, does it not?”

Evaristus stared at his hands. It did make him feel something, for sure. Sadness. Nostalgia. A heightened desire to forge his path of revenge and retribution. 

“You must have felt something during it.” 

“Yeah…” Like that cold sweat I woke up in, Evaristus finished mentally.


	3. Chapter 3

One of the first things Ashiok had enforced in Evaristus’ mind was the concept of flipping his sleep habits to do it during the day so he could be free for the night. Ashiok had said it would enable him to examine the dreams of those who slept at a more decent hour, but so far, he had not been to observe anyone else’s dreams. 

Most of this had been due to the fact that Ashiok would often take long absences, just to “take care of business, catch up with friends, and all”. When they were around, they did do much with Evaristus in the way of tutoring, but bits and pieces here and there, with the occasional promise of going to harvest nightmares did not an exciting time make.

But now, he was finally getting the chance to follow in his mentor’s footsteps.

Both wore hooded cloaks as they strode through the grassy, sheep-filled fields outside Akros; Ashiok needed one to protect their bare arms from the chilling wind, Evaristus, to protect his identity in case anyone saw him. He hadn’t spent a lot of time there, but he didn’t want to be known as a rogue mage running around messing in people’s dreams. He had been warned about that by his mentor, who, although very cautious in who they confided in, confessed that they were known by many on Theros as a mysterious architect of terror. Even Evaristus had heard of them, after all; would he too want that reputation?

As they went, Ashiok’s smoke flowed and swirled in a much wider radius than it usually did, feeling along every nook and cranny. Tiny wisps of it occasionally broke off from the rest and slithered away into the night, then came back a little longer, rejoining the larger mass.

Lately, he had tried to emulate his mentor’s smoke with a charm that made grey mist float from his shaven head. He knew the smoke was, for Ashiok, an extension of their magic and a way to make up for their lack of eyes, but he thought it would be cool to emulate as a simple fashion statement.

Evaristus caught a wisp between his fingers when he thought Ashiok wasn’t looking. It waved gently in his hand, filling him with a sense of the sea - cold winds, salt spray, churning waves, the deep, suffocating pressure of sinking beneath them all, never to return to the surface... 

Uncomfortable, he let it flutter away.

“Here,” Ashiok suddenly said. They stopped in front of a small hovel with a low door, tilting their head. “Something wonderful is in here.”

The home was shoddy, made from wooden boards, cloth draped over it to keep the wind out.

Evaristus looked disapprovingly at it. “Can’t we look somewhere else? Somewhere fancier?”

“Don’t judge a dream by its cover.” Ashiok brushed aside the curtain that served as the door to the dwelling. Inside was a messy little room with not much in it besides a shepherd’s crook and the young satyr who seemed to wield it. 

He was asleep, curled on a pile of woolen blankets, one arm over his head. Ashiok gestured to him with one hand and floated to the side.

Evaristus felt a rush of excitement as he knelt next to the satyr. His brief stay in Meletis was due to a tutoring session on dreams, in which his instructor had taught a simple charm to look into those of another person. There had been a mention of “respecting privacy” and “not delving into personal thoughts”, but Evaristus had mainly ignored that.

The dream the satyr was having was muddled, furious; the very nature of the creatures lay in the joy of freedom, the right to live as they chose - which was mainly partying the night away and being hungover in the mornings. 

In this dream, that was not happening. 

He was being apprehended by guards, repressed, torn away from his wild lifestyle. The rest was somewhat abstract, but still had that same choking feeling of being trapped.

Ashiok had said each dream could be boiled down to one emotion - many were of a neutral feeling, but others were of happiness. Some were fueled by sadness, lust, or fear. The first trick to pulling them into reality was identifying the emotion, and then the more specific driving force that caused it in the dream. 

Evaristus didn’t have to look any more to know the driving force. Fear spurred by the absence of freedom was a powerful enough concept. 

The spell to bring the dream to life was muttered under Evaristus’ breath, and it came forth in a burst of magic. The sleeping satyr bleated and kicked before settling back down, and the dream, taking form in a ball of smoke and magic, flew into Evaristus’ arms. He cradled it, mind spinning with all the ways he could use it to his advantage. Perhaps he could find some leonin warrior who feared this feeling of being trapped, and he could combine this dream with some other one, and then…

Oh, the power he could hold! It filled with with a happy feeling Evaristus hadn’t felt in a very long time.

Beside him, Ashiok grinned. “Well done.”

\---

Evaristus kept the dream huddled close under his cloak as mentor and student fairly ran back to the abandoned temple Ashiok frequented. Moments after stepping inside, Evaristus let it out and held it in his hands.

“This is what you do often, right?” The ball of smoke shifted in his hands. 

“Of course.” Ashiok gestured to their smoke and horns. They were sitting in their favourite stone chair again. “Where do you think all this came from? The dreams of mortals, the dreams of gods even - all in here.”

“Amazing.” Evaristus looked back and forth between the dream he made and his mentor’s smoke, trying to work out how many of what he had could fit in there. 

“I did… sacrifice some of myself for it.” A black claw traced the rim of what was left of Ashiok’s head. “But it’s like a lexicon, in some ways. It holds all the dreams, fears, and creatures that reside in the minds of everyone I have come across.”

One day, I’m going to be like that, Evaristus thought to himself. I’ll surpass Ach… mentor. 

Ashiok smiled, as if in response to Evaristus’ thoughts. 

“But you can shape the dreams you bring, right?” Evaristus fiddled with the smoky ball, pulling it here and there. “Mine is just…”

He tried to shape it like clay, and it hesitantly molded into a birdlike shape, with lumpy wings and screwed beak. 

“That is a skill that comes with time. Abstract concepts, like you have, don’t take well to physical forms,” Ashiok said.

“Ah.” The ball of dream moved and shifted in Evaristus’ hands, taking the shape of a smooth, sleek crow before collapsing again into a ball. “I’ll keep trying, then.”

\---

Evaristus did indeed try over the next month, going out most every night to harvest soft, malleable dreams from the shepherds and workers that lived in the Akroan countryside.

He experimented heavily, trying to mix and mold different dreams into one and shape them into birds and snakes and other little animals. They all lived in the same temple that Evaristus did, filling every nook and cranny. Balls of inspiration, they were.

“Seems you’ve been busy,” Ashiok said, gazing around at the myriad nightmares swarming the temple. They had been away for a while, and coming back to that was a surprise. 

Evaristus nodded and grinned. He held one dream-crow in his hands, stroking its feathers. It made him feel a sense of a lack of privacy, due to its nature, but the feeling left as it did. 

“I believe I’m ready to create a nightmare of my own, now. I’m fairly confident in all this, and…” He inhaled a deep breath. “It makes me feel so powerful.” 

“That was the intended effect, no?” Ashiok laughed.

“It was.” Evaristus found his cloak, almost vibrating with excitement, and went towards the door. “I’m going now.” 

Ashiok let him, watching their student disappear into the young night, wondering whether he would need their parting advice.

He wanted to find a leonin, first and foremost. They lived in the rolling hills and plains, he knew, and it was a long trek to the nearest camp. With every step he took, senses of fear and excitement battled within him, spiking whenever a sudden noise came from the brush.

The creatures were violent and destructive, leading raids to gather supplies, or so he’d heard. Small parts or Iretis had often been attacked by individual groups before the final devastating strike. Leonin were said to be excellent trackers, hunting adversaries from the brush before pouncing, just the same as less sapient lions. One could be waiting mere feet from Evaristus right now, cloaked in the shadows...

Evaristus nearly lost it when a hand descended on his shoulder.

“Stop your gibbering; it’s just me,” Ashiok said, releasing their hand.

Evaristus took a minute to regain his breath and normal heart rate. “What are you doing here?!” he finally managed.

“I simply came to look at your progress.”

“Well, I haven’t made any yet,” Evaristus said, turning back to face Ashiok.

“Ah. I won’t bother you further. But keep in mind - “ Ashiok said as their student turned away again. “Don’t pick the strongest among them. Don't do anything suspicious.”

"Yes, yes, of course."


	4. Chapter 4

Before, Ailouros’ nightmares were followed quickly by the comfort of his mother, her soft furred arms around him and her rasping tongue on his forehead. This time, it was absent when he awoke.

And that wasn’t the only thing missing, either.

The leonin cub stared around the campsite, his pupils full as they could go. Ailouros couldn’t hear or smell the first trace of his pride, and saw not the first hair of anyone. Flipped over tents, cracked pottery, and scattered weapons told a tale that struck more fear into him than the nightmare he had just suffered through. 

He called for his mother, uncurling from the tight bun he had been sleeping in. No answer came, but he caught a glimpse of tall shadows moving silently through the trees.

“Mom?” He breathed the word again, fur standing up. 

One shadow moved forward, and for a moment, it seemed the shape of a maneless leonin. The other shadows behind it seemed to sharpen and become the silhouettes of his pridemates, standing in the dark, watching him.

Internally, Ailouros breathed a sigh of relief. “What happened?” he said. “Where did everyone go? Why…”

The words died on his chops as the shadows moved into the light of the dying fire. These were not his pridemates.

“Seems like we missed one, fellows,” the Meletian guard said, drawing his sword. It was stained with blood, blood that Ailouros immediately knew belonged to his mother. 

They all fell upon him, and their swords carved into his hide. 

Ailouros woke screaming.

\---

“That was a wonderful idea, Evaristus.”

Ashiok’s student preened in the light of their approval. “Why, thank you mentor.” He swelled with pride; they had never called him by name, before. Ashiok must be more fond of him.

The two sat in the old temple, Evaristus surrounded by his dream-crows, Ashiok wreathed in their smoke. 

“The idea of a nightmare within a nightmare is… a bit cliché, but the included metaphor of revenge and the loss of usual comfort intrigued me.”

“I got that idea from the dream of a child.” 

“Good matching - a nightmare for a child, inspired by the nightmare of one. Children share innocent fears like that.” Ashiok nodded. Their cheek twitched, something Evaristus had often noticed.

“When I was a child, I had dreams like that.” Evaristus let a crow hop into his lap, and was drenched in a feeling of being quite literally tied in knots. 

Ashiok sat up a little. “Oh? Tell me more.” 

“Well… my mother is a traveling philosopher. She send… sent letters a lot.” Suddenly nervous, Evaristus pushed the crow out of his lap. “And I often feared she would never return home. She always tried to visit every season, but…”

For a few moments, he couldn’t speak for the lump in his throat. How many seasons had passed since Olexa had last visited...? If she hadn’t heard the news, had see come back to find…? 

“I see. Would you care to enlighten me about your nightmares now?” Ashiok steepled their fingers in a way that reminded Evaristus of his stuffy old Meletian tutor.

“I thought you knew what they were.”

Ashiok put a hand on their chest. “Why, do you think I would invade your privacy like that?” They gave their student an innocent smile.

“Yes.”

The smile quickly turned to a frown.

“A-anyways, my nightmares are, eh… are uh…” Evaristus quickly looked away from their mentor’s face. They did unnerve him sometimes, and right now, their unhappy expression made his skin crawl. “They focus on the death of my family…”

“Obvious.”

Evaristus hung his head. “I haven’t been back there yet, to my home, so I have no clue how it happened.” He sat in silence for several minutes.

“And you suppose they died, despite not knowing how it went?” 

“I’ve heard there were no survivors from that part of Iretis.” Evaristus swallowed. “Given that I’ve seen Iretis from afar, and how ruined it is, I’ve given up hope.”

“Better to move on, you think?”

“Or course.” 

It wasn’t the entire truth - some small part of him still wished for things to be different - but revenge would feel better than the near-impossible task of scouring the underworld for a feeble glimpse of his family.


End file.
